With my battered mouth swollen and sore, I had difficulty speaking so I started to listen
Last week I had an emergency wisdom tooth extraction. It left me puffy, swollen, and – with the exception of a few words forced out of my mouth’s good side – unable to speak. It was weird spending a few days impersonating a particularly dribbly, side-talking Clint Eastwood. But, judging by other people’s responses, not as weird as it was for them.
My boyfriend was the first to come undone. “It’s eerie – you coming into the room but not saying anything,” he’d protest. I tried to imagine how unnerving it must be to have half of the household (of two) go silent. And when I spotted him in the kitchen at midnight, batch-cooking mashed potatoes for my recovery and filling the silence by singing “your lovely facial lumps” to the tune of My Humps, I, too, was unnerved. But also touched.